


Makeshift Gauge

by lovetincture



Category: Loveless
Genre: Bedsharing, Coda, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-19
Updated: 2020-12-19
Packaged: 2021-03-11 04:20:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,097
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28169145
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lovetincture/pseuds/lovetincture
Summary: After their run-in with Seimei, Soubi needs comfort and so does Ritsuka. Neither of them really knows how to do right by the other, but they sure do try.Coda to Volume 8 of the Loveless manga.
Relationships: Agatsuma Soubi/Aoyagi Ritsuka
Kudos: 15





	Makeshift Gauge

In the aftermath of Seimei’s intrusion, the Seven Voices Academy is in a state of uproar. People are hurt, and dead, and no one knows for sure how many. Seimei did this.

People ask them a lot of questions, and Ritsuka meets people he’s only ever met behind the pixels of a computer screen. Soubi’s no help. It’s Natsuo and Youji who pull them along, leading Ritsuka and Soubi by the arms, pulling them into Nagisa-sensei’s quarters so they can get some sleep.

_ Sleep. _ That’s what he needs.

His head feels like it’s stuffed with cotton, and he’s just so tired. The room is nice, he guesses. He honestly doesn’t even notice. Everyone decides that Soubi is his—his problem, his responsibility—and they leave them alone together, trusting Ritsuka to sort it out.

_ Don’t, _ he wants to say, but it doesn’t make it past his mouth.

_ I don’t know how, _ he thinks at nobody.  _ I don’t know how to do this. _ More than that, he’s pretty sure that he doesn’t want to.

Soubi is having a time. There’s something lifeless behind his eyes, and any suggestion that anyone makes is met with “I don’t know.” There’s something here. Something’s wrong with him, and Ritsuka can  _ see _ that. He knows this isn’t normal, that it has to do with seeing Seimei again. It’s just… god, he’s so tired.

He had to see Seimei too. He loved Seimei first. For a long time, he thought he loved Seimei most. There’s no space to grieve that.

He wants to be kind, but he’s tired.

“Just… get undressed,” he says. “Just come to bed.” On a different night, he might want to add  _ please, _ but Soubi wouldn’t want to hear it anyway. “Don’t waste my time,” he adds.

He can hear the sounds of Youji and Natsuo through the door, the soft sounds of two people getting ready for bed. He wonders whose bed this is. The unfamiliar linens are starched and coarse beneath his cheek. There’s the smell of an unfamiliar detergent and below it, something like bleach. It smells institutional and makes his ears lie flat against his head.

He watches Soubi, who doesn’t move.

He crosses his arms and closes his eyes, stubborn. He didn’t bother to turn off the lights, and he regrets it now, the overhead glow coming in past his eyelids and stinging his eyes. He’s too stubborn to get up and change it.

After a long, long time, a wait that seems like forever, one of his ears pricks, catching the sound of fabric rustling. He listens to Soubi getting undressed, feeling his cheeks flush as he turns to face the wall. A minute later, the lights go out. He feels the bed dip as it shifts to accommodate Soubi’s weight.

It’s not a big bed, but it’s big enough that they don’t have to touch if they don’t want to. Ritsuka doesn’t want to. He wants to be left to himself, to his own hurts. He wants his grief to be a private thing. He doesn’t want to share it with anyone.

…but he can practically  _ feel _ the need coming off Soubi in thick, suffocating waves. It’s cloying in the still, hot room. Soubi is lying perfectly still, but there’s still a vibrating tension leaking off him. It gets Ritsuka right between the eyes, gives him a headache and makes the hair stand on end all over his body.

He huffs, rolling over to face Soubi. His eyes still haven’t adjusted to the dark, but he can see the vague outline of shapes. Soubi has his face tilted up toward the ceiling. Ritsuka can make out the outline of a well-known nose, and he wonders when it got like that. Since when is Soubi’s face so familiar, that he could trace it without seeing?

He can tell Soubi’s eyes are open. He can tell that he’s awake.

“Soubi.”

Soubi turns to him, just a blur of indistinct shapes. “I’m sorry. Did I disturb you?”

“Stop apologizing, stupid.”

“I’m sorry.”

Ritsuka closes his eyes, and he counts to ten. “Just… go to sleep. Can you sleep?”

There’s a rustle that might be Soubi shaking his head. “I don’t think so,” he says, somehow still saying sorry without actually saying it. “But I’ll be very quiet.”

“That’s not—I’m not worried about  _ me. _ When I ask if you can sleep, it’s because I’m worried about you.”

“Why would you worry about me?”

Ritsuka sighs. “Because you’re my—” Friend? Boyfriend? Fighter? “Because I just do, okay.”

“You don’t have to worry about me, but I appreciate it, Ritsuka.”

“Someone has to worry about you because you won’t.”

Soubi doesn’t have an answer to that, and Ritsuka turns over again, snuggling into the itchy blanket and trying to put it out of his mind.

He can’t.

True to his word, Soubi is very, very quiet. It somehow nettles Ritsuka even more, knowing that he must be holding himself so carefully still instead of actually  _ sleeping, _ the big idiot.

Ritsuka grumbles something under his breath, then, “Come here, Soubi.”

“What?”

He’s still terrible at listening for someone who demands to be ordered around all the time, but at least now he’s stopped saying  _ I don’t know _ over and over. He sounds honestly puzzled and more like the frustrating Soubi that Ritsuka knows. It makes Ritsuka feel a little safer, like they’re back on solid ground.

“Come over here. I won’t say it again.” He pats the bed the way he’d call a puppy, yawning so wide it cracks his jaw.

He’s not going to be able to stay awake for much longer, Soubi or no Soubi. The day was too long, too strange. His heart feels too much like something that’s been cracked open.

Soubi hesitates, and Ritsuka doesn’t know why when it’s so clearly something he wants. Finally, he slides into the space beside Ritsuka, cautiously fitting himself around Ritsuka like he’s not sure he’s still allowed to touch. Ritsuka huffs. It’s not like that’s ever stopped him before, stupid Soubi.

He positions Soubi like he wants him, so it’s not too hot and comfortable enough to sleep, pushing Soubi onto his back so he can lay his head on Soubi’s chest. He picks up one of Soubi’s long arms and wraps it around himself like a blanket.

“There,” he says. “I’m right here. I’m not going anywhere, now  _ go to sleep.” _

“Ritsuka,” Soubi says, soft and barely there, breathed out like a prayer. There might be more to that thought, but Ritsuka doesn’t hear it.

**Author's Note:**

> Title is a reference to "I Found" by Amber Run. You can find me on [Twitter](http://twitter.com/lovetincture) if you'd like to say hi!


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